1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cell culture shaking device and a shaking culture method as a cell culture method for accelerating culture of cells in a culture vessel.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the related art, the cell culture of suspension cells used in a cell culture, specifically in an immune cell therapy is carried out by manual operation in most cases. For example, the cell culture is carried out by inoculating cells sampled from a patient in a flask to which an antibody (inducer) is immobilized together with a culture medium, storing the same in a incubator, taking out the flask every day from the incubator, observing the culture state (for example, the state of proliferation) using a microscope or the like and, when it is determined that the proliferation or the like is taken place, or after having elapsed a predetermined time period from the inoculation of the cells, and adding the culture medium to the flask to allow the cells to be cultured (for example, to proliferate). When acquirement of a large amount of cells is desired, the cells may be transferred to a culture bag from the flask and cultured therein.
The type of culture performed in the flask or the bag includes a static culture in which the culture vessel is kept standstill and a shaking culture carried out, for example, by oscillating a platform or the like for placing the culture vessel.
However, in the static culture of the cells, since the distribution of the cells and the concentration of culture medium components are unhomogeneous, the control of the culture environment is difficult. In addition, since the oxygen supply capacity is lower than the shaking culture, there are some problems for inducing the proliferation of the cells to the maximum. In contrast, in the case of the shaking culture, the cells in the culture vessel are rolled on a culture surface by oscillating the culture vessel, and hence there is a problem that extensive physical damages of the cell may be resulted.